The End is Hurt
by Quinton Notwen
Summary: The Doctor's secret is revealed upon the fields of Trenzalore. The Last of the Time Lords will save the universe but at a great cost to himself, whilst the Doctor watches. One Shot.


It took some work and the TARDIS definitely hadn't liked it but she had finally relented; and was fuming a few meters away. The Doctor looked down at the machine he had made. The most horrific weapon ever conceived, built by the Doctor, all but ready to be deployed.

He looked to the sky. In one instance it was serene, the bluest sky a sunny day, in another instance it was chaos and flames and the roaring savagery of a billions galaxies dying in pain and suffering. The Doctor shuddered, the war had turned hellish, and the universe was dying. The younger races didn't, wouldn't, know it, but they would suffer; their realities would shatter and splinter. The higher races knew it though; the Eternals had fled to realms unknown. The other time sensitive species had been twisted and warped and the war was slowly poisoning them, even the Time Lords and the Daleks were slowly being destroyed from within.

Beyond the sky the great fleets of the Time Lords were scouring the universe in search of the Doctor. They had plans for the moment's power. If he was honest the Doctor knew the Daleks were in search of him, too; though they likely had no clue of the moment's existence. This was how he came to this place, the last place any time traveler would come. He looked up at the hill; the looming monument towering above him; the smaller stones and pillars surrounding him, the nameless casualties of some battle that would be, had been.

The Doctor looked over the device, the final weapon that would end the war. It was a jumble of wires, and copper tubing; iron rods jutted out of it. The thing sparked and hissed malevolently like a jungle cat waiting to draw its claws across reality. A single, red actuator glowed waiting for his hand.

His fingers played over the actuator. He could feel the warmth of the light, inviting him to press gently and unleash the end. He closed his eyes tightly, the thoughts of all his friends, family, his companions, fellow Time Lords, and even the Daleks flowed through him, a tear built in the corner of his eye. His arm tensed and as he prepared to press the button an icy gust whipped around him pushing him backward. He opened his eyes and looked up; the sky was black, boiling with storm clouds, and then the sound. The Doctor spun around.

"The greatest hiding place in the universe. The last place they will search for you, only a barbarian would come here, and whilst you're a rebel, you're not a savage." The man said confidently as he walked purposely towards the Doctor.

His face was grizzled; a mustache and beard, faded white, circled his mouth. His skin was scarred, ragged; his eyes were steel blue. The hair on his head was thinned and white. He walked slowly forward, picking his steps as he did. His leather boots crunched on the dried leaves; his hands deep in the jacket pockets. He stopped several yards from the Doctor.

"This can't be…" The Doctor whispered, squinting in exasperated surprise. He instinctively took a step backwards. "You can't…"

"Oh, Doctor, Doctor, Doctor…" The man shook his head. "You should know better than that."

"But,**_ I_** shouldn't be here - me being here is a danger to all of history; the paradoxes…" The Doctor became stern. His hands clenched into fists. "This is an abomination."

"There it is; the righteous indignation, that's the Doctor I remember." The man said smiling and nodding. "This is what it is. It has to be this way. It is the only way this can happen."

"No, you don't understand, you physically cannot be here!" The Doctor spun around and looked over the device he built. He turned back to the man. "If this works, then…"

"It works, but I found a way to break in." The man said, he took a deep breath.

"But that would require…" The Doctor looked over the man.

"Yes."

"But you're…" The Doctor took a step forward.

"Yes."

"No, you couldn't have." The Doctor shook his head, he put his hands to his head. "What did you do!?"

"I did things, horrible things. The blood of innocents is on my hands." The man said, he pulled a small chained pocket watch from his coat pocket matter-of-factly, inspected it and then replaced it. "We haven't much time, my break-in was noticed, and well, everything is coming here, the entire Time War is coming to Trenzalore."

"Why are you here!?" The Doctor growled, tired of the man's flippancy.

"To make a sacrifice." The man said. He walked forward. "To do the thing you could, no, would never do."

"That, you've already done." The Doctor sneered, moving slowly to put himself between the man and the moment. "The things you had to have done, the damage you had to have had inflicted on reality to be here. The innocent lives you had to have taken to get here. The very idea is…monstrous."

"That is not the sacrifice, and trust me; what is going to happen is going to haunt you." The man said as he continued to advance. "You were at the Fall of Arcadia; you watched as that War TARDIS detonated the Time Lords' new weapon; you watched the planet burn with your companions still on its surface. You were at the Gates of Elysium when the Daleks detonated the star in the Dronid system and released the ancient nemesis of Gallifrey; you watched as a billion worlds were bled dry as the Time Lords used their ancient enemies to hunt the Daleks. You watched as the Daleks burned across reality and massacred a billion civilizations in a billion different ways. You watched every nightmare, every monster, every something from the shadows rise and consume the innocent. Pointless death after pointless death, so many rehashed and re-played. Even when you've found out about the Lord President's solution; you hesitate because in some way you wonder if you have the right. And the answer is, 'no', the Doctor does not have the right to push that button." The man pushed passed the Doctor and looked down at the button as it glowed ominously. "The Doctor's morality would never allow him to do this; even though it would return sanity and peace to a universe that has been torn apart by madness and rage." The man tilted his to look back at the Doctor. "When you lost your great grandson you cut your hair and donned that leather jacket; but you kept your title and refused to be broken by the sorrow. Only a man who's lost all hope and given up could push this button, the one thing the Doctor never does, ever, is give up. Only a man who has decided that there was no other choice; that the only way to bring peace and sanity to the universe is to push this button could ever push this button."

"The things you've done are far worse than pushing that button. I'm stopping monsters. You had to kill innocents to just get here!" The Doctor spat, he grabbed the man, spun him around and clutched the lapels of his overcoat. "You're a monster as great as the Time Lords or the Daleks!"

"The things I've done, the blood on my hands of millions of worlds, I did to make sure this button is pushed, Doctor. I had no choice, because you didn't give me a choice." The man snarled, defiant against the Doctor's indignation. Then he became calm, his eyes were cold and he looked through the Doctor; it was a stare that could only be imitated by a corpse. "This place is a surprisingly peaceful point in history; probably because you've been avoiding it for the majority of your existence, but that's soon to change. The entire Time War will be here, and I will be here, and you will be here to see the button pushed. In very short order this will become the most complicated moment that has ever existed, and then the real fun begins."

"Fun?! Is that what this is? A chance for you to spectate!?" The Doctor hissed. "If you think I'm going to let you get away with this..."

"Of course not." The man drew his hand from his coat. A staser was pointed at the Doctor. "Haven't you been listening, I'm here to assure that the button is pushed."

The Doctor felt the sting, it blasted through his body. He convulsed as his grip loosened on the man's lapels. The Doctor staggered backward; his hand landed on his chest between his hearts. The world became fuzzy and he felt himself tumble backward. He could see the silhouette of the man leaning over him.

"What are you doing?" The Doctor coughed. He could feel it coming, the flash of light, the comet across the medulla oblongata, the miracle beginning again.

"Sacrificing myself, for you; I'm taking the responsibility off your hands and being the monster that the Doctor could never be." The man said. The Doctor could feel the man lifting him. "I lost the one thing that I most cherished in all of the universe; and for it I will only get rebuke; you see, Doctor, this will be your greatest secret the greatest shame of your life will be the knowledge of the man who never could being forced to watch the man who could and knowing the suffering that you'll cause. The Last of the Time Lords, the man who ended the Last Great Time War; is the same man, but one is the Doctor and the other is me."

The Doctor was going to respond was going to try and stop the man, but he felt a twinge as the staser damage finally started burning out his nervous system.

His mind was a haze. He took a deep breath; the smell of acrid smoke burned his nose. He jumped up and then regretted it. Golden energy wafted from his hand. Suddenly, the memories shot to the forefront. He was in the TARDIS, under the steampunk console. He lifted himself up and staggered himself against the console. His hand wandered over to the monitor swinging it over and he looked. On the screen was the man standing on the fields of Trenzalore. A massive fleet of Dalek saucers and War TARDISes hovered low in the sky. The Doctor coughed as more orange energy flowed forward. The Doctor watched as the man leaned forward. A light issued from the device. The TARDIS rocked and the rotor in the middle of the console heaved up and down as circuits exploded and the whole of the ship vibrated. The Doctor fell back and his back crashed against the steel pylons, he doubled over. He looked up, to find a ghostly apparition of the man standing by the console.

"History is fixed, Doctor." The ghost said. "You can never go back. The universe is sane, the war is over; you are a hero of a kind. Only the higher races will ever have an inkling of what went on; and most will be warped by the ending; but in the end you saved the universe. History will remember that the Doctor stopped the Last Great Time War; that you made it happen, and maybe one day, you'll come to accept what you had to do to end it."

The ghost flickered out of existence. Explosions erupted across the TARDIS as the Doctor slid down the pylon and sat on the floor. Sparks and flames rained down as he stared at the monitor. He was still catching the sounds of the last day, as the Time Lords and the Daleks screamed and tore to escape the moment's detonation. He hung his head and then threw it back and screamed angrily as the TARDIS burned around him.


End file.
